Thinking Inside The Box
by idlewords
Summary: Sometimes ruggedly handsome writers come back into your life after you'd given up hope. Sometimes, things just aren't the same as they were before. Sometimes, you're stuck in a packing crate with a nine year old on a sugar rush. Fictional season 3.
1. Chapter 1  Danning Canning

The Danning Canning company was a giant, non-descript, gray, square brick factory in a row of other giant, non-descript, gray square brick factories. In fact, it was completely and wholly unremarkable. If you were to look inside the Danning Canning company, you would find the typical things one would expect to find in a factory called the Danning Canning factory. There was a front office, and there were shelves covered in a thick layer of dust and also some boxes, and there were vats of things that one would expect would eventually be canned. Oh, and there were cans of many shapes and sizes, and a conveyor belt, and various impressively large crates for shipping the types of things that come in cans to the types of places that were likely to sell the things that came in those cans. None of these things are remarkable in any way, shape, or form, except that one of these very large crates contained two bodies.

Don't be alarmed. In fact, the two bodies in the crate were very much alive – at the moment they were, anyway. One of the bodies belonged to a very famous mystery writer named Richard Castle, and the other to a not-as-famous police detective named Kate Beckett. At the moment, both of the owners of these bodies were very uncomfortable, as two bodies stuck in a packing crate were likely to be, and these two bodies happened to be very stuck. Of the two, Beckett seemed to be the most uncomfortable, for two reasons. The first reason was that she was awake, and the second reason was that her left elbow and shoulder were pinned under Castle. Oh, and the rest of her body, too. In fact, at the moment, Rick Castle was lying directly on top of her, and when she had awoken, mere moments ago, lying in the dark of the packing crate with a splitting headache, she had briefly entertained the possibility that she was pinned against the wood of the packing crate by Castle's dead body, but a steady stream of warm and fresh drool against her shoulder had told her otherwise.

Castle let out a soft snore, and much to Beckett's alarm, started nuzzling her neck.

"I love..." he sighed sleepily, "I love...cherry pie. Can I have another slice please?...And one for the garden gnome, too."

"Castle..." Becket whispered irritatedly, and shifted around, jostling Castle's head with her shoulder.

"...pie in the face! Not funny garden gnome!" Castle mumbled.

"CASTLE!"

"What the..."

"Castle", Becket said, a definite air of annoyance in her voice, "Get off my damned elbow."

"Why..." Castle groaned sleepily and shook his head. "Where? What? Wait – too many questions. Let me put them in order."

Kate laid there irritatedly, with Castle still on her elbow, as Castle thought for a minute.

"Okay, question number one...where are we and why is it so dark?"

"We're in a packing crate...I think...judging by the size and the fact that a splinter is working its way into my arm – Castle, will you get off my arm?"

"Oh, sorry." Castle wiggled and shifted his weight a little bit. "...there. Better?"

"Much." Beckett moved her now free appendage to get the blood moving again.

"Okay, second question – Why are we in a packing crate."

"Because you never stay in the damned car."

"Oh."


	2. Chapter 2 Eddingway

Author's Note: Due to some confusion, I'll explain some things about the formatting of the story here. Chapters will alternate between the present, with Beckett and Castle stuck in the packing crate (CH 1, 3, 5, etc), and flashbacks (CH 2, 4, 6, etc), which will eventually explain (if you're patient), how Castle came back, how they got into the packing crate in the first place, along with a few other assorted twists and turns.

**SEPTEMBER (TWO MONTHS AGO)**

Sometimes in life, you'll be faced with a period in time that seems like it's going to be downright horrible, only to look back on it after several months and realize that it wasn't as bad as you feared it would be, and at times it was even enjoyable. This summer wasn't one of those times for Kate Beckett. At the beginning of the summer, Kate had feared that the next few months would be a little lonely and awkward, but she was wrong. In fact, they were much more lonely and awkward than she had at first anticipated.

Take this morning, for instance. Once again, Kate Beckett had run into Tom Demming in the workout room, and just as always, they engaged in exactly three minutes of absolutely excruciating small talk. This happened approximately once every week, and it never got any better. In fact, it had gotten progressively more awkward with each encounter, and this time, Kate had actually walked into a punching bag in a desperate attempt to flee the situation. Tom Demming was a nice, seemingly normal, attractive, fun guy, and had Beckett not broken things off, she was sure they could have had nice, seemingly normal, attractive fun together. But Beckett had broken things off, and there would be no nice, seemingly normal, attractive fun for her this summer. No, in a fit of sheer lunatic brilliance, Beckett had decided to throw a real relationship away for one that apparently only existed in her head and office innuendo. What made things worse was that, to Demming, it seemed as if Kate had called things off for absolutely no reason, which always made running into him just that much more uncomfortable. He had rebounded quite quickly, after he helped a gorgeous model recover millions in stolen jewellery from her wayward assistant, and occasionally, Beckett ran into the pair of them in the elevator on their way out for the evening, or making plans for fabulous weekend beach house excursion.

So, while Demming enjoyed the fabulous view of his new model girlfriend, and while Castle enjoyed the amazing view from his beach house in the Hamptons, Beckett enjoyed the somewhat less amazing view of the precinct from her desk, including a very conspicuously empty chair. Coincidentally, she had tried to move the unoccupied chair temporarily – she had tried giving it away to other homicide detectives, and had even put it in the break room one day – but it turns out that the only place in the entire precinct that the chair didn't constitute an enormous fire code violation was tucked in to the other side of her desk. Some days, she didn't notice it at all, but other days she stared at it glumly, and it seemed to stare back at her – as much as an empty inanimate object can stare back at you. Once, Kate had brought in a potted plant to dress up her empty chair, but Esposito gave her a look so sad and pitying that the potted plant immediately moved to the break room.

In fact, Esposito's hangdog looks of support had become all too frequent around Beckett, as if he had appointed himself some strange morose personal support coach. Quite frequently, he would greet her with a nod and a solemn fist pump, as if she were some brave little toaster battling some long and incurable illness. Lanie, on the other hand, had gone from sympathetic, to overly positive, and very eager to set Kate up with every man she knew, including her brother, her cousin, her landlord, her accountant, and most recently, her mailman. And Ryan – well, Ryan had started to have strange phone conversations with his mother. This morning, as Kate descended the steps from the locker room to the precinct, she could see Esposito and Lanie huddled talking, while Ryan lovingly cradled his cell phone to is ear.

"Aww...baby, you know I do. No, I love you more. No, I do. I do. I – I've got to go mom." Ryan abruptly ended his call as he noticed Kate approaching. She gave him a strange look.

"You talk to your mom like that, Ryan?"

"I – er...yeah. That's right."

"You know, you can talk to your girlfriend at work. I don't mind. It's kind of sweet." Kate said. Ryan laughed nervously, and Kate turned to see Esposito and Lanie staring daggers at him. Quickly they changed expressions. Esposito gave Beckett a solemn nod and a fist pump, while Lanie beamed overeagerly at her.

"Uhh...hey guys."

"Girl, I have found the perfect man for you: tall, handsome, charming..." Lanie started.

"Let me guess...your doctor?" Kate cut her off.

"Dentist?" Lanie offered.

"Not interested. Anyone seen the paper? It's usually lying on my desk in the morning."

"Paper? Naw, I haven't seen any paper." Ryan answered quickly. "Esposito, you seen the paper?"

"Nah. No paper delivered today. Probably not important." Esposito followed.

"Uh...huh." Kate looked back and forth between them. Something strange was going on. She peered at each of her friends closely. They looked back at her innocently. Out of her eye, on another desk, she spotted what she was looking for. "That's okay," she said, moving quickly towards the desk, "I'll just borrow this one. I'm sure no one will mind." Snatching the paper triumphantly, she looked back at her nervous friends. Esposito was mouthing something angrily to Ryan.

"Eddingway?" Kate asked, reading Esposito's lips. "What's an eddingway?" She began rifling through the paper, looking for something about an Eddingway. Three pairs of eyes locked on her face and froze.

"Eddingway is..." Ryan stuttered nervously, "Eddingway...I GOT A PUPPY! Yeah, a puppy, for my girlfr – for my mother."

"You named your dog, Eddingway?" Kate peered suspiciously at Ryan.

"Yeah, after – after my uncle. I have an uncle named Eddingway. It's a family name."

"Uh...huh."

"Yeah, and uhh...we're paper training him, so uhh...I kinda need that paper." Ryan grabbed the paper out of Kate's hands.

"Well, can I at least read it first?"

"Eddingway really prefers to do his business on unread newspaper."

"Uh...huh. What's really going on here guys?"

"Nothing. Everything's fine. Everybody's just doing fine." Esposito added solemnly, adding a supportive fist bump. Lanie tried to give Kate her most reassuring smile. Ryan looked at the other two shiftily, and then added his own supportive smile. Kate gave them her best sobering interrogation look. Ryan was starting to buckle under the pressure.

"You know what? I think I'm going to go find a newspaper. I'm going to get to the bottom of this little mystery. Whatever you three are trying to keep from me, I'm going to find it. " Kate said, and made a bolt for the elevator. The three rushed after her, but many an awkward and lonely summer hour spent working out had Beckett in top form and she reached the elevator button before the other three were half way across the office. Just as they were getting close, the elevator doors popped open, and Kate hurried inside, knocking over a man carrying a large cardboard box.

"Ooof!"

"Sorry about – Castle?"

"Nice running into you, as always, detective." Castle wheezed. She had knocked the air out of him. Still, he looked up at her from the ground, and grinned.

"You're back!"

"I am back...and on my back coincidentally. Little help?" She grabbed his hand, and pulled him up. He began brushing himself off.

"What do you know about an Eddingway?" Kate quizzed him. Castle looked puzzled.

"Eddingway? Is this some sort of reinitiation ritual? I give up. What's an Eddingway."

"I don't know. Seems to be a mystery around here."


	3. Chapter 3 Brute Force

PRESENT – DANNING CANNING – PACKING CRATE

"Sooo..."

"...sooo..."

"Okay, this may seem like an obvious question, but how do we get out of this packing crate?" Castle asked.

"It is a pretty obvious question. You know, I don't think I've ever been stuck in a packing crate before, Castle. Have you?"

"Noo...although, funny story, I was stuck in a suitcase once. It was..."

"Castle, present situation."

"Right."

"Okay, so imagine you were writing a book Nikki Heat and Jameson Rook were trapped in a packing crate together. What would you write?"

"If Nikki Heat and Jameson Rook were trapped together in a packing crate? You really want to know what I'd write?" Castle asked incredulously, already drifting off into some smutty scenario.

"Right. Let me rephrase. If Nikki Heat and Jameson Rook were trapped in a packing crate together, how would you write_ their escape_?"

"Wait...I'm not there yet." Castle said, deeply lost in thought.

"...Castle..."

"...Almost..."

"...CASTLE!"

"...there! You're an excellent muse, you know. That's going to be a fantastic chapter. Where were we?"

"Escaping?"

"Oh right. Escaping. Well, I would just write in some sort of secret door or loose hinge or something."

"So, basically, your great idea for escape is Deus ex machina? Some sort of fortuitous twist of fate?"

"You should speak Latin more often. It's very hot." Castle purred. Beckett sighed exasperatedly.

"Okay, so say your editor didn't like your twist of fate idea. What would you do then?"

"Brute force?"

"Brute force. Not a bad idea."

"What are you doing?" Castle asked, feeling Kate scrambling underneath him.

"Using your idea," Kate said, grunting.

"The first idea?" Castle asked, hopeful.

"Nope," Kate said, curling up into a tight ball underneath him. "Brute force." Suddenly, Beckett's legs sprang out, battering the lid of the packing crate, and unfortunately, propelling Castle's body into the lid with them.

"Owwwwwwww. Ow. Ow. Owwww! What the – Jee – STOP!" Castle screamed, as he collided with the lid a few more times.

"I think I loosened it a bit." Kate said, hopefully.

"I think you dislocated my shoulder a bit." Castle whined, hurt.

"Sorry about that." Kate apologized sincerely.

"If I didn't know better, I'd think you enjoyed that."

"...well..."

"Hurting people isn't fun."

"Tell me about it."


	4. Chapter 4 Great Expectations

Sometimes, when a really important event is approaching, like perhaps the return of an old friend, you'll envision how you'd like that event to play out. Sometimes, the event goes exactly how you'd imagined, and it gives you a sense of great fulfillment and success. Both Castle and Beckett had, over the course of the summer, envisioned exactly how Castle's return to the precinct would play out. They had both pictured it in great detail, over and over to the point that each was fairly confident that things would run smoothly. Both were wrong about at least one crucial thing, however, and neither scenario would quite play out as planned.

SEPTEMBER (TWO MONTHS AGO) – TWELFTH PRECINCT

Castle brushed himself off, and held his arms out in a grand display.

"My people! It's good to be back at the twelfth. Who wants a hug?" Castle had, of course, rehearsed this greeting over and over in his head, and in Castle's imagination, it had been met with great enthusiasm by his long-lost precinct buddies. In reality, however, it fell about 75 percent short of his expectations. Looking from left to right, Castle saw a grinning Beckett...and then a trio of vicious attack dogs disguised as his former friends. Richard Castle was feeling a little less like a welcomed pal, and a little more like Julius Caesar.

"Okay...no hugs for the peanut gallery," Castle said, taking one cautious step back towards the safety of the elevator. He turned back to Beckett, tugged her closer by the sleeve of her blazer, and stage whispered in her ear. "What's wrong with these three?"

"I have no idea," Kate stage whispered back, "If I didn't know better I'd say someone's Eddingway died." A vein in Esposito's forehead began to pulsate ominously. Castle and Beckett contemplated the stony-faced group like a particularly fascinating murder board.

"Well, I must say, this isn't going at all as I planned," Castle said, putting on his most winning smile, "But, I do know one thing that might turn it around. Guess what's in the box."

"I hope it's an axe." Esposito said.

"Oh, I don't need an axe." Lanie said. "I've got something sharper downstairs." Castle frowned at them.

"Close..." he said a little nervously, "It's free new Nikki Heat books for everyone. Yaaaaay!"

Esposito, Lanie, and Ryan all stared at him stonily. Ryan then reconsidered, and reached his hand out for the free book. Lanie slapped it back. Ryan frowned at Lanie, and then turned back to Castle with a look of reproach, as if it were Castle who slapped his hand back.

"Okay, okay, you all don't need to push and shove; I have enough copies for everyone." Castle deadpanned.

"I want one! I want one!" Beckett said, grabbing a book out of Castle's hand. "I mean – I might read it, you know, when I have the time," she said with false non-chalance, throwing a wink at Castle.

"Hey Castle," Esposito said with far too much intensity in his voice as he glowered at the writer. "Welcome back. My colleagues and I were wondering if we might have a word with you. Alone. In the hallway." Esposito's glower made Castle gulp loudly. If he didn't know any better, Castle would have thought that Esposito wanted to hit him. This was not at all going according to plan. Castle had worked so hard on fixing things this summer and now things seemed to be three times as awkward at work.

"Come on guys," Beckett cut in, "Quit it with the hazing. I'm sure we all want to know how Castle's summer went. Why don't we all go into the break room and get a coffee and he can tell us all about it?"

"Oh no," Lanie cut in, "I don't want to know 'all about Castle's summer.' No one wants to know 'all about Castle's summer.' Isn't that right Detective Esposito?"

"Oh, I definitely don't want to know about Castle's summer." Esposito said threateningly. "No one here wants to know about Castle's summer."

"I – I kind of want to know about Castle's..." Ryan said nervously before Esposito shot him a look. "No? No...I'm good. I don't need to hear about Castle's summer," Ryan said, shaking his head profusely.

"I'm sorry, Castle, I don't know what's gotten into these three lately." Kate looked sternly at her three friends, and then back up at Castle apologetically. Castle smiled at her reassuringly.

"Don't worry. You know what? I'm just going to talk to them. Clearly they have some information they're all dying to tell me, so I'm going to just going to go into the hall with them, and they'll tell me whatever it is, and then we'll all have those gourmet donuts I had sent down this morning and celebrate the new book. Maybe I'll even find out about this Eddingway."

"Oh, you'll find out about the Eddingway." Lanie snarked.

"If they tell you, you had better fill me in, Castle." Kate demanded.

"Of course," Castle said, now being dragged away by the small angry mob. "While I'm gone, read the dedication in your book. I think you'll like it." Castle and his three non-amigos disappeared around the corner.

Beckett bit her lip, waiting for a few seconds before tearing open the cover. Except for Lanie, Ryan, and Esposito, so far, everything was turning out great. She would have liked to have a word alone with Castle, but that could come later. Written in very neat scrawl inside the hard cover of her book, Castle had written the following message.

_To the extraordinary Kate Beckett. _

_It's been an honour, as always, pulling your pigtails._

_Hoping this year won't be so awkward,_

_R.C._

Beckett grinned broadly, twirling a strand of her own hair, and then quickly looked around the office to make sure that no one had caught her in the act. This was even better than she had imagined. Castle had no idea about what happened with Demming, so that was kind of a bold statement on his part. She couldn't wait to tell him once he came back. Things, she thought, were about to get decidedly less awkward. Beckett frowned and looked at her watch. Whatever they were talking about in the hallway, it was sure taking a long time. Perhaps, Beckett thought, she would kill time by reading the first chapter of Naked Heat – or at least the dedication, which she hoped would be as good as the inscription.

Beckett turned the page and pored over the dedication. Suddenly she had a sharp intake of breath.

"...Eddingway," she sighed glumly, snapping the book shut. "Of course."

Sometimes, when you're working on a difficult problem, inspiration can strike at unforeseen moments. Detective Beckett had just experienced one of these moments when she had read Castle's dedication. She had a sudden epiphany, and knew exactly what Eddingway was. Sometimes solving a particularly difficult mystery can depend on special knowledge privy to only a few individuals. For instance, Eddingway could be an old flame, someone you graduated a police academy with, a long lost uncle, a little known village where someone grew up, an obscure brand of golf club, or, as unlikely as it sounds, maybe even a puppy name. All of these would require some sort of special knowledge of what or who Eddingway was. Sadly, Eddingway was none of these, and indeed, Beckett had no special knowledge of an Eddingway person, place or thing. She did, however, have special knowledge of her coworkers, Esposito and Ryan. Sometimes special knowledge about the people hiding a secret is just as important, like for example, if they have the mentality of six year olds and are particularly fluent at Pig Latin.

Kate opened the book again, hoping maybe she had read the dedication incorrectly, and that just maybe, Ryan really did have a puppy named after his uncle Eddingway.

_To my dearest wife Gina,_

_Without whom this novel, and my life, would be incomplete. _

Closing her eyes and fighting back tears, she took a few deep breaths to steady herself, before heading to a nearby wastebasket, and pulling out a discarded newspaper. There, on the first page of the Entertainment news, was a small picture of Castle smiling brightly next to Gina, with the caption 'Wedding bells ring out for best-selling author'.

Just then, Castle and the small group returned from the hallway. Castle looked as stunned as she felt. Their eyes met, and they just stared at each other for a minute. Now, nothing was going as planned for either of them. Beckett held up the newspaper for the group to see, and they all looked back at her guiltily.

"So, Castle," she said sadly, "I hear congratulations are in order on your Eddingway."


	5. Chapter 5 The Dark

PRESENT – DANNING CANNING – PACKING CRATE – DARKNESS

A lot of people are afraid of the dark, but actually being in the dark, as Castle and Beckett were now, can be quite a blessing. While it is true that you can truly never be sure exactly what lurks out in the dark, when you're stuck in a packing crate scarcely bigger than a coffin, you can pretty well be sure that the only thing lurking out there is the person piled on top of you, or under you, as the case may be. As an added bonus, in the darkness, no one can see what you are up to. In this instance, what Castle was up to was pouting like a four year old, and what Beckett was doing was laughing.

"It's not funny." Castle pouted, rubbing his shoulder.

"I'm not laughing." Beckett lied, using all of her available might to clamp her mouth shut.

"You are too!"

"Am not!"

"I can feel your chest moving!"

"Well, maybe you shouldn't be feeling my chest in the first place."

"Well, that's pretty unavoidable now that you've dislocated my shoulder."

"Did not!"

"Did too!"

"Let me see it..." Beckett groped around for his shoulder.

"No! You'll hurt me again, you scary, freakishly strong woman."

"I won't hurt you again. You made a horrible battering ram anyway. Too soft and squishy."

"I am NOT soft and squishy! I will have you know that – ahh...uhhhh...oooh...how did you – ohhhh..." Castle trailed off into a litany of various cooing and purring noises as Beckett rubbed his sore shoulder muscle.

"Good?"

"So...good...don't...ever...stop...seriously..."

"You know, this would all be so much easier if we could actually see the inside of this crate, but I think I must have dropped my flashlight when I was hit over the head." Beckett thought out loud as she continued to massage Castle's shoulder.

"Ooh! Flashlight! I have a flashlight – a little LED one on the keychain in my back pocket."

"You have a flashlight? You've had a flashlight all this time, and you've waited until now to reveal that very important piece of information to me?" Beckett was making her very best exasperated face right now, but it was useless in the dark where Castle couldn't see it.

"Well, you know, some of us were busy being concussed and used as human battering rams..."

"Alright, alright...I'm sorry I used you as a human battering ram. Aren't you tired being trapped like this?" Beckett sighed.

"So wait...are you asking me if I'm tired of laying on top of you in the dark while you massage my shoulders?" Castle quipped. "Because..."

"Just get me the flashlight Castle."

"Right." Castle squirmed and wiggled one way, trying to slide one of his arms underneath him so that he could access his back pocket. He grunted and shifted his weight forward, twisting and turning this way and that. His face hovered right above Beckett's, and she could feel the warm air from his panting and straining on her cheek. Although Castle had already drooled on her shoulder, she wasn't hit with what an intimate situation they were in until she felt his breath on her cheek. She swallowed hard. Castle shifted again, and his cheek pressed into hers. She could hear the scraping of his elbow against the side of the crate. Suddenly, he stopped.

"Cathew?" Beckett asked (it is very hard to say the name Castle with someone's cheek pressed tightly against yours.)

"Uhoh." Castle panicked and wriggled again. Beckett turned her head away so that she could speak more clearly.

"You're stuck aren't you Castle?"

"Maybe."

"Great."

"Actually, I think it might be easier now for you to reach around and grab the keychain out of my pocket," Castle suggested. "Try it." Kate groped blindly around Castle's backside. "Lower," Castle called out helpfully, "...lower..."

"I can't feel anything." Beckett said, puzzled.

"Are you sure?" Castle asked. Beckett squeezed.

"No keychain."

"Try the other pocket." Beckett groaned, but reached around and found the keychain. After five minutes of twisting and grappling Kate had the keychain, Castle's elbow came loose, and the pair were back where they started.

"Well, that could not have possibly been more awkward." Kate said, remembering the strange pretzel-like position she had been in moments before. Kate had been using that expression a lot lately, and it seemed like every time she said it, something immediately happened to prove her wrong. This was no exception to that rule, because immediately after said this, she turned on the flashlight, and while it is awkward to have someone lying on top of you while trapped in a packing crate in the complete darkness, it's much, much more awkward when you can see them three inches from your face.

"Wrong again, Kate. Wrong again."


End file.
